No sooner had the word gone out yesterday that outgoing Sen. Bill Frist (R.-Tenn.) would not seek the Republican nomination for president in ’08 than sources close to the physician-politician were telling me: “Watch where Team Frist goes.” And immediately after saying that, a source close to Frist said: “They’ll go to Romney.”

By “Team Frist,” people close to the senator usually mean Linus Catignani, who headed up Frist’s personal political action committee and is a partner in the Cat-Bond fund-raising company (along with Linda Bond, wife of Missouri Sen. Kit Bond), and Alex Vogel, past chief counsel to Frist and to the National Republican Senatorial Committee when the Tennessee senator was its chairman. In addition, Washington “superlobbyist” Jack Oliver -- former deputy chairman of the Republican National Committee and longtime finance director for George W. Bush’s presidential campaign -- had been considered a likely player in a Frist-for-President campaign. With Frist out of the ’08 sweepstakes, the Missourian President Bush dubbed “Ollie” is expected to throw his considerable fund-raising weight behind Romney.

Can Frist himself be far behind the “Romney Express” if his top campaign team is poised to hop on? According to the same source that tipped us on “Team Frist,””The Leader [what intimates call Frist] will back Mitt Romney, in part because he can’t stand John McCain.”